I work in publishing and I like to read things. Herewith: free association on books, nice things I ate, publishing, editing, and other nice things I ate.

Saturday, May 09, 2009

Momrat takes on the internet

[We're driving in a car. I'm explaining how we can watch the original Abba video for "Take a Chance on Me" on this thing called Youtube, if we like.]

Momrat: Here's the the thing. I just don't understand how it works.

YT: How what works?

Momrat: You know. The internet. Why is there all that information? What is Youtube, and why is it THERE?

YT: It's just like real addresses, Ma. You know, when the mail truck is looking for you, they need to get to Smith Street, then they find #4. Well, think of Youtube as Smith Street, and the Abba video as, like, #87,400. And Google is like the phone book, where you find all the addresses.

Momrat: ...

YT: Does that make sense?

Momrat: No.

YT: Why not?

Momrat: What is it all doing in my HOUSE? Why is it in a little BOX? Did it come in on a WIRE, or something? [Waves hand wildly at windshield.] Why is all the information floating out there? Is there just an Abba video floating out there in the air? Why does that stuff even exist? Where was it before the internet?!

I actually have a comment to make that has nothing to do with your post (which was, admittedly, thought provoking and hilarious at the same time) -

I was reading down the side-bar of your blog, going through the various things you've linked to, and you mentioned that a group of rats was a 'mischief.' This made me think of a 'murder' of ravens, and presented me with an interesting book title: Mischief and Murder. It will obviously be a book about rats and ravens, and will most likely be the short childrens/YA that I'd been considering writing and working towards getting it published (for, in your words, my 'platform' from which I will launch my first full length fantasy novel.)

If I do write Mischief and Murder, you will feature prominently in either the book itself or in the credits, as the progenitor of the idea. ♥ Also, I love your blog. x3

LOL. Well actually, (to my understanding,) all the information on the internet has to be stored on computer hard drives SOMEWHERE, it's just that we never see these computers, because the information is TRANSMITTED via "floating in the air."

So the internet does, in a way, exist physically, but it's spread out on computers all over the place.

Writtenwyrdd:Now I'm getting an image of millions of data servers chained up in hell. Demons prod them with tasers to keep them crunching data as fast as they can. They sit there in the brimstone-and-burnt-plastic scented darkness, grunting and sweating as the internet scorches their mechanical brains.

I actually think deleted code is quite fascinating since it's not really deleted, but just sitting there headless on your comupter until the day something new is written over each piece of its body, one byte at a time.

It could be worse...she could make an attempt at using the internet. My mom does, and it's not pretty. In other words, I am her own personal help desk. UGH! I tried to correct her email smileys to no avail. They look like this: :=>>. She said it had a double chin and she continues to use it. :-D

She accepted television at some point in her life, right? No reason to understand exactly how it all works but just acknowledge that it's pretty much a good thing.It's trying to make sense of it that makes your head spin. Far better to just dive in and coast.

Writtenwyrdd:Now I'm getting an image of millions of data servers chained up in hell. Demons prod them with tasers to keep them crunching data as fast as they can. They sit there in the brimstone-and-burnt-plastic scented darkness, grunting and sweating as the internet scorches their mechanical brains.

The Internet: It's like a sweatshop for robots.I've worked in IT. You're not that far off.

It's late to comment but I can't resist telling you that this is one of the funniest exchanges I've ever read. It belongs in a play, although there'd have to be a huge pause for audiences to recover...I don't know what other dialogue could ever top it.

My husband and son and I have been wiping tears off our faces for the last 5 minutes. If they weren't laughing so hard, I might think it was the med's for my root canal, but I don't think...it's just FUNNY. Abba videos floating in the ether...it is hard to wrap your mind around.

"What is it all doing in my HOUSE? Why is it in a little BOX? Did it come in on a WIRE, or something? [Waves hand wildly at windshield.] Why is all the information floating out there? Is there just an Abba video floating out there in the air? Why does that stuff even exist? Where was it before the internet?!"

These are simple answers which I have listed below:

1) "What is it all doing in my HOUSE?"

It's in your house because you have a connection to the Internet in your house (through your computer, probably, but also possibly though your cell-phone or other wireless device). Disconnect the "internet connection," meaning the cable from your modem to your PC, or just unplug the device that serves as your modem, and voila, your house is clean.

2)Why is it in a little BOX?

I assume that by "box" you mean computer. it's in the computer so that you can view and work with it. As noted above, however, computers are no longer the only devices which "have" the Internet.

3) Did it come in on a WIRE, or something?

In most cases, yes, it comes in on a wire right to your PC. In some cases there may be a "wireless router" which beams the data through the air (after it is piped to the wireless router via cable) much the same way your TV remote beams data through the air at your TV to tell it what to do.

4) Why is all the information floating out there?

It's not so much that the info is "floating" out there, like with radio and television waves, which truly are floating out there all the way to space where they continue on...but that it is linked or "networked" together from where it lives on millions of individual computers and other data storage devices. Sort of like a hive mind. So when you plug into the Internet (i.e. "network") you are connecting to millions of other computers with whatever they happen to have stored on them.

5) Is there just an Abba video floating out there in the air?

There are Abba vids from the early MTV broadcasts which are now probably jusst leaving our solar system--these are floating out there. The Youtube Abba vids, however, are not floating anywhere but are isntead just data files residing on someone's computer somewhere in the world (which is or was at some point connected to the Internet).

6) Why does that stuff even exist? It exists because people created it. Files can be created on computers in various ways, including downloading digital video from your own camera, or from another computer via the Internet.

7)Where was it before the internet?!"It existed in different formats. For example, the Abba video was some kind of 16mm film reel or whatever they shot music videos in the early 1980's with. At some point, after computers becamse more advanced, someone (I'm guessing whoever owned the rights to Abba's music) converted their Abba video into digital format so that it could be viewed and distributed online.

Another example would be your Mom's personal snapshots from when you were a kid, before there were digi cams. They're prints. Supposed you scan one in and e-mailed it to your Mom. It's now on the 'net. "where was it?" before the net? It was a print photo, probably by Kodak.